File No. 861.00/725
[Enclosure—Translation]
Declaration of the Russian Provisional
Government, September 25/October 8, 1917
Our country is again experiencing grave trouble. In spite of the
speedy suppression of the Kornilov uprising, the1 shock occasioned by him is menacing the very existence
of the Russian Republic.
Anarchy is reigning in the country; the pressure of the external
enemy is increasing; counter-revolutionary elements are raising
their heads, in the hope that the protracted crisis of
authority, coupled with the feeling of exhaustion in the
country, will help them to kill the freedom of the Russian
people.
Great is the responsibility which the Provisional Government
bears before the people in its mission to lead the country
safely to the Constituent Assembly. This responsibility is
lightened only by the profound belief that, united by a common
desire to save the country and preserve the achievements of the
revolution, representatives of all classes of the Russian people
will understand their common aim of helping the Provisional
Government to create an authority capable of practical work and
able to solve the principal questions of the nation and to lead
it without further trouble to the Constituent Assembly, the
meeting of which must not be postponed for a single day.
Although supreme authority in the solution of all the great
problems upon which depend the welfare of the Russian people
must belong to the Constituent Assembly, the Provisional
Government considers it its duty to strain all its efforts in
the satisfactory solution of a series of measures of prime
necessity.
In the firm conviction that only a general peace can give our
great country an opportunity for developing all its creative
forces, the Provisional Government will continue to pursue its
active foreign policy in the spirit of the democratic ideals
announced by the Russian revolution. Acting in full agreement
with our Allies the Provisional Government will take part at the
coming conference of Allied countries, where Russia will be
represented by a person enjoying the full confidence of the
democratic organizations. At this conference our representative
will endeavor, in addition to coming to an agreement with our
Allies regarding our common war aims, to effect an agreement
with them on the basis of the principles announced by the
Russian revolution.
While striving for peace, the Provisional Government will exert
all its efforts towards the protection of the Allied cause,
towards the defense of the country, and a firm resistance to all
attempts to force a foreign will on Russia, and towards
expelling the enemy from the country.
In its endeavors to increase the fighting strength of the army,
the Provisional Government will work along democratic lines. The
choice of a commanding staff well prepared technically and
answering the requirements of modern warfare, and at the same
time devoted to the republican order, and working in close
cooperation with the army committees will be made the basis in
the organization of the army. By these means will be paved the
way towards the establishment of military discipline, without
which a powerful army is unthinkable. An exact definition of the
rights and duties of the army committees will be announced in a
separate decree, which will lend them due firmness. One of the
measures necessary to raise the fighting strength of the army is
to
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decrease the number
of mobilized men at the expense of the rear organizations which
have unduly grown, by discharging first of all the older
soldiers.
The desire to preserve the country from further economic
difficulties and to diminish the heavy burden lying on the
shoulders of the laboring elements of the country, prompts the
Provisional Government to take the following measures,
supplementing and developing what has already been done by the
Government:
The Provisional Government will endeavor to fix firm prices on
the main products of industry, regulating at the same time the
mutual relations between capital and labor particularly as to
wages and working time. Cooperative societies will be widely
utilized in the preparation and distribution of foodstuffs and
manufactured articles. The private commercial apparatus will be
widely utilized for the same purpose under direct state control.
State control will be introduced over the industry with the
participation of representatives of the capitalists and the
working classes who will be entitled to intervene in the
management of industrial concerns for the purpose of increasing
production. Labor exchanges and conciliatory boards will receive
further development for the purpose of protecting the right of
workers in all branches of industry to coalesce and at the same
time protecting the technical staffs from arbitrary action.
Preliminary measures for gradually demobilizing industry and for
diminishing suffering from inevitable unemployment, and, in
particular, a plan for social work intended to remedy the damage
inflicted by the war, will all receive due attention.
The solution of the land problem will be effected under the
direct supervision of the local committees, to which will be
transferred all lands of agricultural value, without, however,
violating the existing proprietorship. The land committees will
be entrusted with the full exploitation of such lands, in order
to save the national wealth from further disorganization.
The Provisional Government proposes to undertake a revision of
inheritance taxation, taxes on surplus incomes and on luxuries,
to introduce a tax on property, to increase the existing
indirect taxes and to introduce new sources of income in the
form of financial monopolies.
The democratic legislation in local government will be further
developed, gradually handing over to the municipalities the
management of all matters of a local character.
Measures guaranteeing to the nationalities the right of
self-government will be enacted by the Constituent Assembly. The
Government will take steps to secure for the national minorities
the right to use their own language in schools, law courts, in
municipal institutions, and in communication with state
institutions.
The Provisional Government is fully aware that all these aims
cannot be achieved in the short period remaining before the
meeting of the Constituent Assembly. But the initial steps in
the realization of these aims will help to lighten the task of
the Constituent Assembly and will give the Government effectual
support in its active defense of the country and the restoration
of the national economic life, as well as in its resolute fight
against counterrevolution and anarchy, which are ruining the
country and the revolution.
In this struggle, as well as in all its undertakings, the
Government will act in close cooperation with the democratic
organizations, seeing in such cooperation the most effective
means for the solution of the problems before the country.
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To insure the Government contact with the organized forces of the
country, and thereby to gain the necessary strength and
firmness, a Provisional Council will be formed, to act until the
meeting of the Constituent Assembly. The council will be
representative of all the elements of the country and will also
contain the delegates selected by the Democratic Congress. The
council will have the right to address interpellations to the
Government and to receive replies within a definite period, to
work out legislative measures and to consider all those
questions which will be referred to it by the Provisional
Government or which may arise out of its own initiative. The
Provisional Government will consider it its duty to consider in
all its actions the national importance of the council until the
time when the Constituent Assembly will give to all elements of
the country full and perfect representation.
Firmly standing in support of this program which expresses the
hope of the whole people, the Government invites all the
citizens to immediate and active preparation for the Constituent
Assembly. The Government hopes that all the citizens will unite
around it for common work in the name of the fundamental and
prime questions of our time—the defense of the country from the
external enemy, the restoration of law and order, and the safe
conduct of the country until the convocation of the Constituent
Assembly.
A. Kerensky
Prime Minister
